• Medha Gautam, David H Shaw, Ted D Pate, and H Wayne Lambert.
• Dr. Gautam is Associate Professor and Section Head of Pharmacology, Department of Applied Dental Medicine, School of Dental Medicine, Southern Illinois University; Dr. Shaw is Professor and Chair, Department of Oral Biology, College of Dentistry, University of Nebraska Medical Center; Dr. Pate is Professor and Division Head of Biomedical Sciences, Department of Diagnostic and Biomedical Sciences, The University of Texas School of Dentistry at Houston; and Dr. Lambert is Professor, Department of Neurobiology and Anatomy, School of Medicine, West Virginia University. mgautam@siue.edu.
• J Dent Educ. 2014 Jun 1; 78 (6): 886-94.

AbstractAs part of the Basic Science Survey Series for Dentistry, members of the American Dental Education Association (ADEA) Physiology, Pharmacology, and Therapeutics Section surveyed directors of physiology courses in North American dental schools. The survey was designed to assess, among other things, faculty affiliation and experience of course directors, teaching methods, general course content and emphasis, extent of interdisciplinary (shared) instruction, and impact of recent curricular changes. Responses were received from forty-four of sixty-seven (65.7 percent) U.S. and Canadian dental schools. The findings suggest the following: substantial variation exists in instructional hours, faculty affiliation, class size, and interdisciplinary nature of physiology courses; physiology course content emphasis is similar between schools; student contact hours in physiology, which have remained relatively stable in the past fifteen years, are starting to be reduced; recent curricular changes have often been directed towards enhancing the integrative and clinically relevant aspects of physiology instruction; and a trend toward innovative content delivery, such as use of computer-assisted instruction, is evident. Data from this study may be useful to physiology course directors, curriculum committees, and other dental educators with an interest in integrative and interprofessional education.

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